The Shepherd's Song: A Story of Second Chances

KATE MCCONNELL opened her eyes. Where was she? There were bright lights above her. Movement. The sound of a siren wailing.

She closed her eyes and opened them again, hoping somehow this all would go away. It didn’t.

An ambulance. She was in an ambulance.

What had happened?

A man’s voice called out behind her. Female, age about forty-five, multiple injuries. BP: ninety over sixty. Pulse: one-forty. Respirations: twenty-five, short and shallow.

Each bump and jolt of the ambulance brought pain, crushing pain in her chest and stabs of pain down her right leg. Kate tried to grab her chest, but her arms were strapped down. She shivered uncontrollably. Her blue sweater and pants were covered in something wet—gooey and wet. Blood. He was talking about her.

A brief memory came—her car sliding on the slick road, the sound of breaking glass and crunching metal. A car accident. Panic rose in her chest. She had been in an accident.

The newspaper would later say it was the worst traffic accident ever on that section of I-95 between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore—twenty-five cars, six semis, and one bus. The temperature Thursday had been fifty-five degrees, a beautiful day. Then, Friday, it fell to thirty-one, unusual for October. A sudden snowstorm dropped more than two inches of snow in just ten minutes, creating whiteout conditions that took everyone by surprise, including the drivers on I-95.

The voice behind her continued its calm clinical assessment. In and out of consciousness. Possible head injuries.

Help, she whispered. Each breath was raw. There wasn’t enough air. Dizziness swept over her. She tried again. Help.

Hold on. Try to stay awake. A young man leaned over her, making eye contact. His voice was calm, but she saw fear in his eyes.

She tried to nod but couldn’t.

Be still; we’re on the way to the hospital.

Everything in her wanted to fight free of the straps and the stretcher, but she couldn’t even move her head. Pain radiated from her chest and leg.

The voice began again. Bleeding profusely from a gash in right leg—looks like an open fracture. Possible internal injuries.

For a few seconds there was silence, the only sound the hum of tires on the road.

Will do. We’ll be there in five to eight minutes, depending on traffic.

What had happened? Kate remembered her morning, speeding from one activity to the next, pushing her old station wagon to the point where it shook. An early-morning run to the grocery store, then back home, then a twenty-mile drive to deliver dinner to a friend who was recuperating from surgery, then a stop to drop off the dry cleaning, then five more things on her to-do list. Then the snow had started.

The cleaner’s. She had been trying to get back to the dry cleaner’s, but for what?

She felt a hand on her forehead, and she opened her eyes. The young man’s face came into view again. His nervous eyes studied her.

What’s your name?

She tried to focus. Her name?

Kate . . . McConnell. She gasped out each word.

Your birthday?

She tried to come up with the answer, but it was too confusing. Tears welled up.

It’s all right. Just stay with me.

What hap—? She wanted to finish the sentence but could not.

You were in a car accident on the interstate. He held her arm, feeling for a pulse. There was a pile-up. It’s a mess out there.

Her mouth opened and closed with a question unasked. She wanted to say the words, but nothing came out.

Matt, she finally gasped out the name of her son. John. Her husband.

No one was with you in the car. Just rest and stay calm. We’ve got you.

She could feel the sway of the ambulance as it passed other cars. The voice faded in and out. She closed her eyes.

A new thought came. She might die. Would it be like this, the end? So fast? With so much undone?

Kate’s mind drifted back and forth, weaving in and out of the events of the past week.

I don’t think my life matters, she had told a friend. I’ve been a Christian for almost twenty-five years, and I haven’t accomplished anything. I can’t point to one single person that I’ve had an impact on, even in my own family.

Of course you have. You serve on the church worship committee, you deliver meals every week to people in need, and you’re always writing down scriptures for people.

But are those the important things? Kate had asked. Do those things matter?

John. He mattered. And Matt.

Oh, Mom, she could hear Matt say. You don’t believe all that stuff.

Matt, who had drifted away from faith when he’d started college, now refused to go to church at all.

She couldn’t get through to him.

Was she really dying?

Someone lifted her eyelid. It was the young man. He looked closely into her eye, as if he was examining her soul.

Stay with me now.

She felt the ambulance sway, then the jolt of a sharp turn.

Help, Kate gasped again as pain stabbed through her side.

Stay with me.

A wave of dizziness. Then nothing.

JOHN MCCONNELL hovered over the documents on his desk, every ounce of attention focused on the case before him. Behind him shelves and shelves of legal books reached to the ceiling.

Mr. McConnell. A phone call, line three. His secretary spoke from the doorway.

I said to hold all calls. He continued scanning the document.

I know, but . . .

I am well aware that we all need to get out of here.

From his twelfth-floor office he had been watching the snow fall. Two inches piled up on his windowsill, and reports of accidents had begun popping up on the Internet.

Did you finish those edits on the Johnson case? he asked.

He tried to refocus his attention on the work before him. It was complicated, and now his concentration was broken.

It’s the hospital.

He looked up. Her pale face and wide eyes shattered his calm. A ripple of fear grabbed his stomach. Something terrible had happened. He knew it. He fumbled for a moment with the receiver, then got it to his mouth with shaking hands.

This is John McConnell.

This is Metropolitan Medical Center. We have an emergency vehicle on the way.

Is he all right? John’s voice went up in pitch. His mind was filled with thoughts of Matt. His son was an inexperienced driver, and in this snow . . .

Mr. McConnell, it’s your wife.

My wife?

Yes, Kate McConnell. She’s been in an accident. She’s being transported here.

How is she? What happened? A million questions flooded his mind. He could see Kate as he’d left her that morning, loading the old station wagon with the dry cleaning, recycling, and meals for friends.

"Hey, you’re not taking all of those, are you?" he had said when he saw her carry out the chocolate cupcakes.

Kate had smiled, dimples showing. I saved a few for you.

He touched the note that he had found this morning in his briefcase. Do not be anxious about anything. Her neat handwriting stood out from the crisp white of the paper.

Kate was a bundle of energy and a bundle of life. How could she be hurt?

Mr. McConnell? Are you there?

Yes.

We don’t have the details, but please come as soon as you can.

I’m on my way.

Leaving the file on his desk unfinished, John McConnell ran for the elevator.

MATT WAS IN CLASS when he felt his phone vibrate. He considered ignoring it. He was really engrossed in this lecture. The only other thing that could possibly interest him would be the weekend’s plans. It was Friday, and he was not yet sure what the next few days looked like. Maybe Joe had gotten tickets for the Rusty Bucket concert. Matt slipped the phone out of his pocket.

Emergency. Call me.

A text from his dad. That was unusual. His dad hardly ever called him, much less texted. Something must have happened. Matt was glad he’d sat in the back. He left his books open on the desk and slipped out into the hall. Did they find the empty beer bottles under the deck? He pressed call. Was he going to have to listen to his father’s lecture about drinking and all the legal ramifications?

Dad?

Matt steeled himself for the lecture.

It’s your mother, Matt. She’s been in an accident. She’s on her way to Metropolitan in an ambulance.

Suddenly everything dissolved away: the hall, the classroom, the lecture that he’d been so into. They were gone, and the words coming from his phone were everything.

Not Mom.

He couldn’t take it in.

Son, it’s true. I don’t know her condition. Come to the hospital as soon as you can. I’m on my way there now.

Matt couldn’t speak.

Matt? Are you there? He heard the concern in his father’s voice.

Yeah.

You okay to drive?

Yeah, Dad.

The phone went dead.

Matt stood frozen in place. It couldn’t be his mother. She was the strongest person he knew. He had seen her handle difficult situations with ease, and handle several at once. Mega-Mom, that’s what his friends called her. One tiny blond woman, totally in control. He couldn’t imagine Mega-Mom in an ambulance. It must be someone else. Someone borrowed her car. Something like that.

He waited for his phone to buzz again, for his dad to call him back and say that it was all a big mistake. What if it wasn’t a mistake? No, he couldn’t think that. He had to keep it together. He had to get to the hospital.

A BLAST OF COLD AIR hit Kate’s face as the ambulance doors opened, jarring her awake. She could hear voices. It came back to her in a rush. The accident. She’d been in an accident. She opened her eyes to movement. People were reaching into the small space around her, all talking at once.

Kate McConnell, trauma patient.

Got it. Ready. Lift.

She felt a jar as the stretcher was pulled forward, then lights and swirls of snow. The wheels hit the ground, and they were inside within seconds. Masked faces in white and green hovered over her. Gloved hands touched her.

Two blue eyes looked down at her over a white hospital mask.

I’m Dr. Belding, a calm voice said. I’m taking care of you.

The white lab coat was comforting. His white hair spoke of experience. He was in control. No fear in his eyes.

We are going to fight together, he said. Stay with me.

The face turned, and the voice changed to business.

What IV access do we have?

The paramedic was writing on a clipboard. He answered without looking up. Eighteen gauge in the right and left arms, both running well.

Dr. Belding grabbed the end of the stretcher and started pushing. Let’s get her to the trauma room and get her intubated.

They moved quickly down a long green hall. They rounded a corner, and the motion stopped for a second like a turning of the tide, then all ahead again, into a spotless room with gleaming metal machines and bins of white sterile packages. Mechanical noises came from all directions, beeping and whirring. The gloved hands moved over her, loosening the straps and cutting away her sweater and pants.

What’s the blood pressure?

Seventy over fifty. And decreased breath sounds on the left.

Open up those IVs.

Kate could not seem to grasp what was happening to her.

Can you hear me? Dr. Belding’s voice reached into her confusion.

Can you hear me? Louder this time. Give me a thumbs-up.

Kate wanted to lift her thumb, but the slightest movement seemed impossible. She concentrated. She fought with all the determination she could muster. Her thumb went up slightly.

Good. Let’s get some antibiotics on board, and some morphine, too.

Kate’s body was not her own. She felt someone open her mouth and put a tube down her throat. No. No. I’m here, she wanted to say. I’m still in here. She was helpless as chaos swirled around her. In the midst of it all, one kernel of peace came to her. The Lord is my shepherd.

Of course. The twenty-third psalm. That’s why she had been going back to the dry cleaner’s. The psalm had been left in Matt’s coat pocket.

A memory came—a vivid picture of herself sitting at the kitchen table, carefully copying Psalm 23 onto a clean white piece of paper. She was writing as neatly and clearly as she could, praying over each phrase. Then she was folding the paper into a square and putting it in the pocket of Matt’s wool peacoat. She had imagined him finding it and reading it. How could he not be moved by the promises it held and the clear picture of God as his shepherd?

Instead, anger.

How long would she have to fight with him? And why didn’t John help her with the fight?

Now this.

Dr. Belding’s blue eyes came into view.

You can rest now, he said. We’ll take care of everything.

Wait. Who was telling her to rest? She was confused. Did God want her to rest? No. No rest. She had so much to do. She had to get up and get out of here. Her work was not done.

Not yet, God, she prayed. Please, not yet.

THIS IS WBAL REPORTING live from I-95—the scene of the accident. John turned up the volume of his car radio. The light turned green, then red for the third time as he sat in traffic.

You can hear the helicopters circling as the crash victims are being airlifted out. Luggage and debris are strewn everywhere, blocking the north and southbound lanes. John leaned forward to catch the words.

The snow kept coming down. Big, white, wet flakes piled up on the hood of his car. His wipers thumped rhythmically, keeping a triangle of visibility